Shoot for the Stars
- inwankwo
- Apr 22
- 5 min read
If you look at our social media or our newsletter you’ll see a summary of what we accomplished in 2024 and where we currently stand, but I’m creating this post so we’ll have something documented that we can all look back on.
When you were growing up, how were you encouraged to make goals? Were you told to aim high or make it a realistic goal? I think we’ve all heard the saying, “Shoot for the moon because even if you miss, you’ll land among the stars.” Then comes the astrophysics analyst who takes the saying literally and corrects you with, “Well technically the stars are much farther away than the moon, so you may not reach the stars if you’re shooting for the moon.” So, what’s the correct way?
Unfortunately, things have changed. In the past whenever there was a question, I would simply do some in-person market research and ask people around me during my travels (UBS example). I was going to research some people next to me during this plane ride to get their perspective on setting goals, but I hear a lot of coughing and sneezing and need to stay healthy for events I have coming up. Plus, it’s 2025 which means everyone who’s awake seems to be focused on their screens - #nointerruptions. That means I must figure it all out on my own.
Card Delivery
So, the question remains — What’s best? Low goals to exceed or high goals to stretch? It seems like I always try to stretch things out for our total number of CARDS we receive and
send on a consistent basis. I set goals that I think are unrealistic. I recall when I originally set the goal of 6,060 for the year (that’s shocking now – Secret’s Out – sticking to the promise on this end), we later increased the goal to 10,000 per quarter, and now it seems like our next goal will be able to efficiently manage sending and receiving an average of 12,500 cards on a monthly basis – a total of 150,000 cards per year. That’s what we shared before, but my goals are going to be a bit higher since it’s 2025.
2005: my brain surgery at the University of Michigan
Picture at home after the surgery. 2015: I set up the goal with the board to receive a total of 1,515 cards per quarter – a total of 6,060. We missed that goal and only had 5,973 cards created.
That was before the time where I was comfortable stating, “I have epilepsy, epilepsy doesn’t have me.” So, I opened up and I stuck to my word (Secrets Out Blog, Can’t Complain Blog) & tried to get outside coverage when we missed our goal.
2025: 10 years after missing the original goal, I’m shooting for the moon. My goal is to stick with the 15 number and for us to average 15,000 cards delivered a month. That will leave us with a total of 180,000 cards delivered this year!
That will include our special delivery of cards/bookmarks to Cradles to Crayons. I have a goal of delivering around 5,000 cards/bookmarks to them these next few months with the help of Volunteering Untapped.
That number is 14% more than what we’ve ever done before, but that’s my goal! If you think about it, 6,060 was 29% more than we had ever done before at that time frame so this growth should be a little bit more realistic, right?
If we fall short of this goal, I’ll follow through with the original outline, but with a twist. Here’s the title of the Michigan Medicine article, “Epilepsy Struggle Inspires U-M Graduate to Give
Back”. I got brain surgery at the adult hospital 20 years ago in 2005. The reason the ChildLife department came to the adult hospital with gifts to visit me is because I was volunteering there for years before my first trip to the ER (July 12, 2004). EEG is the reason I make all our partners pinky promise they’ll hand deliver the cards room by room, but that’s the only thing really aligned with my health. If we miss those delivery goals, I’ll allow organizations to position it however they’d like. With more awareness we may be able to get more cards and donations.
Fundraising
Unfortunately, the goal that we’re always short on is the amount of donations raised by our independent donors. It seems that with those fundraisers we put in effort highlighting the
benefits and spend time promoting it, but not as many people are willing to make direct donations. That ranges from specific donations on a certain day (e.g., Giving Tuesday) to our specific
Fundraisers (e.g., Cardz For Kidz Day).
Although our name is trademarked as Cardz For Kidz, we’re doing so much more. This ranges from $15,000 in scholarships this year to spending thousands on portable entertainment systems so ALL overcomers can be encouraged whether they can leave their room or not. For the last two years, at least 70% of our donations have come from companies or designated donations which often have direct ties.
Ideally, we’d be able to increase the donations to help cover shipping, supplies, and help cover part of the scholarships as well. I’m not going to include a percentage, but ideally, we would increase our independent donations (including shirts on our site, apparel via Cloztalk or Facebook fundraisers) to at least $20,000. Originally, I was going to say $15,000, but I know I got limited donations to my birthday fundraiser, so now I’m going to personally make up the difference to make sure we can support our partners. In 2024, Cardz For Kidz sent over 130,000 cards worldwide, and delivered entertainment systems to a variety of nonprofits – but 34% of our total funds were raised by my parents and I.
Since it’s never been done before, many people will say these goals are not realistic. In addition, I’m building up our Ambassador Board who will contribute financially and with their skills. Those goals may be a stretch, but since I’m writing this blog while traveling on a plane, I’ll follow the guidelines and SHOOT FOR THE STARS.
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